If the experts are to be believed, Georgia’s baseball team has nothing to worry about regarding the NCAA Baseball Tournament.
Baseball America and DIBaseball.com project the Bulldog (42-15) as one of the Top 8 national seeds in the 64-team field. If true, it would guarantee Georgia hosting rights throughout the regionals and Super Regionals.
Tonight, the Bulldogs’ selection as one of the 16 site hosts becomes official, before Monday’s noon announcement on ESPN of the top eight seeds and the entire 64-team field.
The Athens Regional will get underway on Friday.
Baseball America and DIBaseball.com also expect an ACC team to journey to Athens as the No. 2 seed, projecting Duke (37-19) and Wake Forest (36-20), respectively.
Baseball America also projects Stetson (40-19) and Wright State (37-19) to make the journey to Athens, with DIBaseball projecting East Tennessee State (40-15) and Utah Valley (27-27).
For Georgia, Wes Johnson’s squad will try to win more games than it did during last year’s postseason run, which fell one game shy of a trip to Omaha following a Game 3 loss to North Carolina State in the Super Regionals.
“I think the biggest difference is we can pitch a little better,” Johnson said after Georgia’s loss to Oklahoma in the SEC Tournament. “But we have to figure out the offensive piece.”
Despite leading the nation in home runs with 132, Georgia’s bats have not always been as consistent as Johnson would like.
Although the Bulldogs hit a respectable .286 as a team, Georgia hitters have also struck out 533 times, the second-highest number in the SEC. Only Ole Miss struck out more (547), playing one more game.
Johnson’s frustration was evident during his postgame press conference following the loss to Oklahoma and projected first-round pick Kyle Witherspoon.
“Witherspoon's been really good against us twice, like really good. But, you know, good teams find a way to grind it out and get off some better swings than we did,” he said. “We're going to have to figure that piece out. Last year, you're running (Charlie) Condon and (Corey) Collins up there, and it doesn't matter who's pitching. This year, it’s just reverse, so we’ve got to figure out the offensive piece. We’ve just got to get runs across the plate against, you know, quality arms, which have held us down this year.”
The Bulldogs are banking on having the opportunity to play at Foley to help the bats.
Georgia is 28-4 at home this year.
The Bulldogs also hope to be at full strength, which would also help the team’s cause.
Ryland Zaborowski (elbow) appears to be fine after missing a couple of weeks. He’ll be the post-season designated hitter for Georgia, which hopes to have Robbie Burnett (hamstring) back on the field Friday.
“I think we're ready to get Zabo back up in the middle of the order,” Johnson said. “When guys are coming back off injuries and haven't seen a ton of pitches or had a ton of ABs, it's not fair to really throw him right there in that 3-4 spot, which is where he needs to live. You move him down in the order and let him get comfortable. But I think Zabo is ready now.”
Johnson feels Burnett will be, too.
“If this were a regional game Robby probably would have played,” Johnson said. But hamstrings are so unique in the aspect that another tweak and he's out, he misses regionals. It was just us trying to be smart for next week.”
